A Bag Bag

I have a lot of scraps of fabric. Fat quarters, 3/8 of a yard, and just...scraps. I don't buy fabric in bigger amounts unless I need it for something. These are things that go on sale for 50 cents to a dollar and they're pretty so I can't help but buy them. But then I get home and I have nothing to make with them. I asked David for ideas for what my next project should be and he suggested our curtains. (We bought fabric for them and everything. It's just a matter of hemming them and doing the top for hooks.) I told him that I needed more practice on little things that don't matter as much. I'm much more comfortable with my machine (and my seam ripper) but I would rather not jump into something so important (the fabric was on clearance because they're getting rid of it and we finished the bolt so if I mess up badly enough, I will have to pick out new fabric and it will most likely be more expensive too. Upholstery fabric is not cheap!) So then he suggested a bag bag.

You read that right. A bag bag. A bag to hold all your plastic bags, usually from the grocery store. We repurpose these all over the house. Plus, when our pile gets too big, we recycle them at the store and start over. Before, we had been storing these in the laundry room, basically all over the floor. It was a mess. I'm so glad David suggested I make one of these. I looked online and found a tutorial (here) and it looked easy enough. I did need to buy elastic but it used a lot of my scraps!

I only made 7 stripes instead of 9 because I couldn't find that many coordinating fabrics and I didn't want to repeat any. It seems to be big enough and I don't want that many bags around the house anyway so this will encourage us to recycle them (or use reusable bags but we always forget to take them with us).

I do recommend spray starching the 1/4 inch of fabric (for the elastic casing, before you fold it over again) so it stays. Without it, I had some difficulty keeping it all together (I try not to use pins too often because I'm terrified of breaking the needle on my machine). I did have a VERY hard time getting the elastic into the casing though. Some people suggested a safety pin but I didn't really understand that method so I eventually got it on my own, pinning as I went to hold the bunches of fabric back because my hands were getting tired. I probably made it harder than it had to be but it was also my first time doing anything with elastic.

My strap is actually a collar from a shirt that I had cut up for fabric anyway (you'll notice it matches the top stripe). Here are my results! The first one isn't stuffed and the second one is. Neither one is in the place it's going to be but I don't have a hook on the wall yet and didn't want to wait to take pictures until David got home. I also apologize for the picture quality. I will mention that there is a darker pink stripe along the bottom that you can't see very well because of the amount of bunching for the elastic. I think if I were to make another one of these, I would make the top and bottom stripes wider than called for to allow for the elastic so they are still shown.